


slow and steady rush

by Metis_Ink



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: F/F, Fluff, disgusting fluff, in purple prose, leave me alone, she has a name i promise
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-09
Updated: 2015-10-09
Packaged: 2018-04-25 15:33:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,918
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4966444
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Metis_Ink/pseuds/Metis_Ink
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Summer, Michimiya believes, is the season of change.</p>
            </blockquote>





	slow and steady rush

**Author's Note:**

> [background music for the gay little heart](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bx6DUQ7uqEw)

 

Summer, Michimiya believes, is the season of change.

It’s an unpopular belief, one bizarrely appropriate and close to her heart. To many, spring is the beginning, and winter is the end. Summer is the steadfast, and autumn is the time where all things realize, as they watch the newness of the world die out into a brilliant red, that time will lead them to an inevitable ending.

To Michimiya, the ending is more beautiful than that. The winter brings a time for new chances, where the old is gone under a landscape of untainted white. She resolves her mistakes and leaves them for a better future. After winter, comes spring, where trees bear fruit and the flowers bloom again. And after spring, comes summer.

In the summer, Michimiya runs.

In the mornings, she leaves the house when sun peaks over the trees and the sky blends soft in the golden hues. This is when she likes it best. Because when she climbs those hills, the roads, the trails, past the ancient shine stairs, she looks up and believes, on this brand new day, she’ll change her life. She’ll find her dream university, discover a new passion, get over her first love, or maybe see, finally, that she can be more than who she is right now.

But it’s stagnant, always. Summer is the season of change, when every day is open and new and full of opportunity, but she keeps running. Past all of her open chances. The flyers around the city, the calls she never makes. One day, this day, should be the day that changes.

For once, it does.

When she stops halfway through.

At the bottom of the shine steps, there’s a necklace glittering against the sunlight. It has a slim chain that pours into her hand like liquid gold, curled protectively around a small silver bird. A swan, Michimiya recognizes, turning it in her hand. There’s no doubt that it’s very valuable; if it’s still here, then the owner must not be far away.

She looks up the shine steps, where the sun rises over the trees.

She turns to climb.

Daichi always used to say she was fast. Probably, she thinks, from all of this running she does. But only one form of exercise won’t help her; she’s never stopped to climb these steps before. It’s an intimidating stretch, breaking from the routine that kept her life balanced and blissful. When she climbs, she can feel a burning in her legs different from the hills. She takes two at a time, for good measure, but slows when the heat is too much.

This is different, she thinks, with the necklace encased in her sweaty palm. This is different, because she was planning on going home today and call up her old club again. She’d arrive early and pretend she was captain again, and maybe have another chance at taking them to Interhigh. She’d be stricter and smarter and even faster than this, but she wasn’t like that, and she’s not like that now.

But this is different.

Michimiya gasps in a breath of the humid air, and stumbles tired over the last couple steps to her goal. She’s going to be late, she realizes, but there’s something wonderful about the feeling. It’s a wave of euphoria, among the stony floors and tree lined hills, and it feels like someone took her heart and the weight from her chest. When she looks up, the world is bright.

There’s a girl.

For a moment, Michimiya believes she’s in a dream. There’s a girl, at the foot of the shine, wrapped in sunlight and poised with the elegance of an eagle. She notices the vivid red of the girl’s cheeks, splotched over smooth white skin that makes Michimiya’s fingers tingle and her stomach flutter with awe. And when she looks back, she moves with her whole body, tall and proud and brilliantly lovely, even more so than the last time Michimiya saw her.

 _Niiyama_ , Michimiya thinks, blood rushing to her cheeks. _Niiyama’s captain_. 

“Oh,” she says. Her voice is small and mousy, and the embarrassment makes her tongue curl up and her voice fade. She— The girl— Niiyama’s captain stands there, unmoved.

“…Good… Good morning,” Niiyama’s captain says, words fleeting, like it’s the first time she could truly speak. When Michimiya catches her gaze, she holds it, taking Michimiya’s breath away. “You’re… Did you need something?”

“I—!” Her heart is drumming in her chest and her mind struggles to keep up. A picture of pure intimidation stands before her and she barely breathe. “This is… Excuse me.”

Before Niiyama’s captain can reply, Michimiya slides the necklace around her wrist and brings her hands up into a hard smack against her cheeks.

The pain is all she needs to focus. When she opens her eyes again, Niiyama’s captain is still there, albeit shocked, but Michimiya’s heart is calm and the fire in her cheeks is invigorating. They meet gazes again, and this time, Michimiya can smile.

“I found this,” she says, pulling the necklace off her wrist. “At the bottom of the stairs. I thought someone might have dropped it.” She holds it up to the rivaling captain, who is wide-eyed as Michimiya approaches her. “Is it yours?”

There’s something strange about Niiyama’s captain. She’s the kind of person you notice the first thing you walk into a room, she just has that kind of presence. That’s how Michimiya first saw her. Her first year, her first tournament in high school, changed, because she saw girl with ferocious determination in her eyes draw the fear right out of Michimiya’s chest. There’s no wonder she’s a Queen; to Michimiya, she deserves every crown in the world.

But when she brings her hand up, to take the necklace from Michimiya’s hand, she trembles. Michimiya recognizes it. She’s guided an entire team of nervous players, and Niiyama’s captain, for all of her grace, goes as far to not meet Michimiya’s eyes.

By instinct, Michimiya takes her hand with a reassuring touch, and places the necklace in it. Her hands are calloused and rough, igniting the admiration in Michimiya’s core. She doesn’t miss how Niiyama’s captain tenses, flinches at the suddenness of the contact, but at this, she finally looks at Michimiya.

Her eyes are like starlight.

“It’s mine,” Niiyama’s captain says. She grasps the necklace with both hands, fingers over fingers. “Thank you. I didn’t notice I’d lost it.”

“It’s a swan, right?” Michimiya says, to which Niiyama’s captain stares at her even more intensely. Michimiya swallows the nervousness that follows, and laughs instead, tapping the taller’s fist. “The necklace! It’s very pretty; it reminds me of you.

“That was the idea,” Niiyama’s captain says. Michimiya is confused for a second, though Niiyama’s captain, in a bizarre moment of weakness, quickly clarifies. “When they bought it for me. Swan. It’s my nickname. People call me that.”

Michimiya wants to reply, she really does, but the sight of this girl, this woman that she’s admired all of high school, look so vulnerable before her, strikes something in her heart. _This is different_ , she thinks. _This is a good different_. Though breathlessness she feels, it makes her wonder how good it really is.

“Swan,” Michimiya echoes. Swan gazes at her. The name suits her, from silky white blond of her hair to the fluidness of her movements. This strange feeling, the warmth that comes from holding her hand, makes Michimiya laugh. “You have a name.”

Swan, at this, shakes out of whatever trace she’s in. “Of course I do?” She draws back her mature confidence, brows furrowing. “It’s not… It’s just a nickname. Not everyone can call me that, my actual name…” She stops herself, indecisive.

But there another thing catches Michimiya’s attention. “Oh, sorry! Sorry, I thought it was so fitting.” She’s blushing again, she always blushes when she’s nervous. This always happens, especially with Daichi, but please, not with Swan too. “You’re very beautiful.” A chuckle escapes her. “I could see you with wings.”

“You can call me that.” Swan doesn’t seem to notice that she’s spoken, but when she does, it’s obvious she didn’t mean to. “I… I mean, you can, Michimiya.”

“I… Thank you?” Michimiya is flattered inside, happy even, but… “I didn’t think someone like you would know my name,” she says bashfully.

“I would never forget it,” Swan says. It sounds louder than anything she’s said before. “Not for someone like you.”

“…I’m not that amazing,” Michimiya promises with an apologetic smile. “I can’t change. I don’t even know what I’m going to do tomorrow.”

It’s embarrassing to admit. Restless, she curls her fingers together, unable to speak further. But another pair of hands join hers, drawing them apart so that their palms meet, and she can feel the tingle of her touch to the tips of her fingers. When she looks up, Swan is there, holding her hands. The background silences when their gazes meet, from the stillness of the trees to the slumber of the cicadas. In that moment, under her gaze, Michimiya feels as beautiful as Swan.

“You’ve grown up a lot,” Swan tells her. “Since junior high.”

Michimiya, voice found, gazes at her curiously. “Did you know me?”

Swan looks like she wants pour out her heart to her right there, but holds back, leaning forward and gripping tighter. “I’ve memorized your voice.” Her eyes flicker with memory, longing. “That hasn’t changed. Not at all.”

“Is that a good thing?” Michimiya asks.

Instead of replying, Swan pauses, and leans forward. Michimiya draws in a sharp breath at her closeness, when Swan’s nose brushes her cheek, followed by Swan’s lips, Swan’s kiss.

It’s not gentle, but it’s hesitant. Swan’s lips are thin and press hot against her blushing cheek. Her hands clench hard enough to hurt, when she lingers there. It’s as if she’s trying to say something, something that can’t be put into words, but Michimiya can feel it from her kiss alone. It’s the touch of summer, warm and beautiful, changing her world.

Swan, with a final breath, draws away, and a wave of loneliness envelops Michimiya before she realizes, finally, what’s happening. She knows this feeling, she’s felt like this for years for one person alone, and it’s the same as what she feels from Swan.

“What was that for?” Michimiya asks. She can’t stop staring at Swan, who glows bright against the rising sun.

When Swan looks at her, it’s like Michimiya’s seeing all of her at once. From her powerful air to the pink of her ears, there’s a woman before Michimiya, one who doesn’t need a crown to prove she is a queen.

“I wouldn’t mind it if you never changed,” Swan tells her. She slips her hands out of Michimiya’s, and regaining herself, her pride, she steps past her, as if she had said everything that needed to be said.

There’s a fire burning in Michimiya’s hands. One that sears from her ears to her palms. It’s the fire of the summer sun, rushing through her body and her brain. Before she can think, her feet are moving, and her voice is calling out, “Wait!”

Michimiya catches Swan’s hand. It’s warm. Everything about her is warm. This is the change of summer.

“I don’t know what I’m going to do tomorrow,” Michimiya tells her boldly. “Do you… Can you change that?”

Starlight appears in Swan’s eyes again. They say the answer before it leaves her mouth.

 

**Author's Note:**

> i hate the m i h a te the m i ha te th he lp m e i lov e michiswa n


End file.
